The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1887-08-31
Romance of the Spinning Wheel.

so common nowadays in artists studios
and show windows, and pictures of the
same as q brand on foreign and domes-
tic goods, without recalling the follow
ing story, which is true in every par
ticular except in names:
Less than fifty years ago it was GUS
tomary for the farmers in northern Ohio
to raise flax for the making of towels,
table-cloths and tow pantaloons for the
farm hands to wear One lovely day in
early spring Honor Hillyer stole softly
into the kitchen chamber and brought
forth the little wheel her mother had
disbanded and put away, her days work
of spinning being done. Honor quickly
replaced the bands, threaded the spool
and with her little feet on the treadle,
for she was then only twelve years of
age, began to draw the long, silvery
thread from the distaff and throw it
off carelessly, as she had seen her
mother do, into artistic curves and pat
terms on its hurrying way to the spool.
She had acquired her skill at the spin
ning-wheel by improving the time to
practice on it when her mother was alb
sent at some weekly meeting of the
church or attending the sick and the
afflicted, for in the country the neigh
bors rely much upon each other for aid
and comfort in times of distress and
trouble. So Honor was not surprised
when she heard her elder sister call out,
Mother, do you hear that child at
your little wheel?" " Yes, l do" re-
sponded her mother, "and l am not
going to tell her to stop, for the yarn she
spins when Pm away from home is so
good that l reel it right on to my own
skein."
Shortly after this conversation Mrs.
Hillver entered the chamber and told
Honor she could spin all she wished to
after others were through with the
wheel, and added, " But keep your
yarn by itself, and you may do what
you like with it,"
Honor was happy. The birds in the
neighboring trees were not more song
full and glad than she. She spun much
that spring and the one following, when
she entered her teens, but that was the
last, for farmer Hillyer concluded it did
not pay to cultivate flax, since cloth of
the kind could be bought cheaper at the
stores than it could be made at home.
Years after this time, when Honor
had come into the full age of young
womanhood, her hand was sought in
marriage by suitors who had been her
companions at sleighing parties, country
fairs and picnics, but her parents pre-
ferred that she should wed Silas Aims
worth, young gentleman from neigh
boring city, and forthwith preparations
were made for marriage with him. A
few weeks before the wedding Mrs.
Hillyer said, Honor, l have been
looking over that chest full of yarn you
spun years ago, when you were child.
1t is as good as ever, and I've notion
to take it over to Widow Grey's and get
her to weave you some towels and table
cloths out of it,"
The next day Honor and her mother
rode over to Widow Grey's, who eX-
pressed herself well pleased to get some
thing better than rag carpets to weave.
On counting the skeins and the mum.
Der of knots they contained Widow
Grey gave it as her opinion that there
was yarn enough for three dozen towels
and four table-cloths. ooh, l don't
wish for so many brown, coarse towels
and table-cloths," exclaimed Honor.
Don't want so many towels? how
do you know what you're going to want.
Girls with curls always have boys. Let
me see-well, if you have as many boys
as you have curls you'll have whole
regiment that'll need toweling. I'll
make 'em hansum for you. The towels
I'll weave in bird 's-eyes, the table
cloths in diamonds, and fore you make
'em up Just bile your cloth out in lye
suds and lay on the grass for week oil
two in the hot sun; then they'll look as
hansum as eny boughten towels
Member what say, the lads will need
all your linen"
Honor thought Widow Grey's eyes
and face looked weird and uncanny a
her during this talk, although sht
believed fortune-telling to be the wors
of fiction; and in this case particular,
it was piece of pleasantly to serve
the occasion. Yet there are times wheI
the idlest of words and most thought
less of comment will prove the mos
weighty and disturbing. So it was now
Heretofore it had been an absorbing
regret with Honor, the thought of leav
ing her country for city home. Sh
loved the country; it was part of he
life, love and worship. There was t
her a soul to nature, and she held dee
spiritual communion with it. Th
subtle essence of beauty, blessing an
blending with seen and unseen force
and forms of being fresh from tn
source of all life was to her an abuI
dant and never-failing source of happ
ness, and she wondered if the town ha
anything to atone or compare with il
and it seemed strange to her that Wdo'
Grey's absurd jokes had power
change the current of her thoughts an
to make all life seem possessed of on
nipotent claims which neither counti
nor city could avert or control.
Nearly year after Honor's marriag
amid the ringing of bells and boomir
of cannon a son was born to he
"Born on independence dayl Cue
he'll see service-indeed, he's got luns
to command regiment. Let's weie
this July orator." said the family do
tor, and Baby Ainsworth was weight
in one of the brown towels Wido
Grey had foretold would be needed fl
boys.
This incident, together with the do
tors play of words about regiment
and service, brought the same fatef
meaning to Honor which she had exp
rienced the year before. The baby W